


In the Old Moon's Arms

by loudspeakr



Series: How Summer Passed [2]
Category: Rhett & Link
Genre: Angst, F/M, Future Fic, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-18
Updated: 2017-03-18
Packaged: 2018-10-07 05:42:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,085
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10353447
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/loudspeakr/pseuds/loudspeakr
Summary: When there's no future left to ponder, Rhett turns to the past and what used to be.





	

**Author's Note:**

> A sequel nobody really asked for. 
> 
> (If you want some musical accompaniment, I recommend [_Such Great Heights_](https://open.spotify.com/track/7vcuTZAFyu0Z5dgMRLR0h0) by Iron & Wine and [_I Forget Where We Were_](https://open.spotify.com/track/6rQvEE7Jvkdwnn8RroMs15) by Ben Howard.)

With every life comes certain regret: Rhett knows this better than most.

For him, there are the little things here and there. There’s his buzzcut – for instance – the day before his wedding, a bad decision that made for less-than-pleasant photos that now litter the insides of old albums he himself doesn’t even keep anymore. And then there are bigger things, memories that still feel as if they’ll swallow him whole someday, like the last conversation he’d had with his brother before he was taken from this world far too soon.

But for a life bordering on eight decades, the good thankfully outweighs the bad. His life’s work now fills multiple bookshelves and many hard drives, the products of forging a career in an industry that had barely existed when he first had his start. It still makes his heart sing to know he’d been able to bring light to so many around the world, a humbling feat for which he has always had immense pride.

And, of course, there’s his crowning achievement: his two boys, all grown-up and moved on now with young families of their own.

It’s this and everything else that fills Rhett’s mind as he lays in bed, curtains left wide open to let the illuminating moonlight through. In the glow, he can see the faces of his family in their frames by his bedside, light catching on dust motes that cling to the glass.

His eyes trail over his son Shepherd, with ever-shaggy blond locks falling over his eyes, his certificate scrolled firmly in his hand. The young man in the picture is nothing like the child he’d once been: a quiet boy with a wicked sense of humour and little patience for study. He’d finished in the top ten of his class in the end, wearing the widest grin on his graduation day. That grin of his lights up the whole photo, his height then rivalling even that of his father’s, gown billowing in the wind where he stood wedged between two beaming parents.

He and Jessie.

Rhett had fallen in love with her again that day, her dark hair falling on bare freckled shoulders, fingernails painted a piercing red. Her arm wouldn’t reach over her baby’s shoulders, so she’d settled for a snug hold around his waist, her hand cupped on his hip like it would when tears were tracing wet lines across his cheeks when he was younger.

They sat in hard chairs under a persistent sun, while programs were used to fan the heat away and forbidden camera shutters clicked at bashful graduates. In the bustle of excited faces, Jessie had reached for Rhett, not a word said, and held her husband’s hand as their baby boy climbed the stage to accept his accolade.

That had been the last time, Rhett recalls, the last time Jessie had been his.

Rhett hopes Shepherd remembers them for their better days. He hopes his son dwells on the times when they still took family vacations, just the four of them, when Mom and Dad still had tickle fights and watched TV together long after the boys went off to bed. He hopes Shepherd glosses over the ugly words he overheard them exchanging late one night from around the corner when he’d gotten up for a glass of water. He hopes that wasn’t what ran through his son’s head when he would open the door to him every Christmas, when they were made to spend time together as a family, however broken they pretended not to be.

It’s been years now since the last Christmas, since the last time he saw his ex-wife. Decades in fact, he realises, and it sends a jolt barrelling through him, the ghost of his marriage making itself known once more. It’s terrible, Rhett knows, but he barely even remembers the colour of Jessie’s eyes. He knows they were hazel, the word coming up easily when the question arises, but the flecked kaleidoscope of her irises… He sees only the flash of hurt when he pictures them now, coupled with pursed lips and a heavy quiet filled with unspoken accusations.

Locke had been angry for a long time. For his eldest son, Rhett became a symbol for the failure of loyalty and commitment, two values in which Locke had held the utmost faith. There had been no convincing him that there would never be a world in which Rhett would no longer love his mother, that sometimes things just fall apart, as do people. Rhett couldn’t stay mad, not at his boy with his stubborn McLaughlin head, not even after his son abandoned him to stand by his mother. Nowadays, Locke is adamant that there were never ‘sides’, but there’s no glossing over the months of nothing, not a visit or a word uttered from son to father.

It was Lily who would bring them back together. She’d visit him, each time entirely unannounced, sometimes with his grandson Charlie in tow, her appearance made even sweeter by the basket of homemade cookies she’d have in hand. That girl was always something special – sunshine incarnate – from the very moment she was born. When Rhett held her in his arms for the first time all those decades ago, he knew she would change his life. They would sit together all afternoon, just Rhett and his daughter-in-law, letting the hours pass as they talked about small things that could hurt no one. It would make him happier than a simple conversation should ever do.

And then she’d say something like, _“Dad misses you.”_

Rhett knows how to keep up appearances. He’s spent years convincing others of his contentment and keeping his own demons at bay. But Lily always saw right through him. Mercifully, she would let him deflect, watching the sadness simmer beneath the surface before moving on. It always left his resolve feeling a little weaker, the gentle acknowledgement of a man Rhett thought would always be by his side.

Footsteps just outside his room have his heart jumping, as if he’s about to be caught with thoughts forbidden to him. _It’s just a nurse,_ Rhett reminds himself, his breath shaky as he lets it loose. In times like this, he tends to reach for his guitar, seeking comfort in melodies born from hours spent in his own company or with another’s. The stand tonight, however, is empty, and where his guitar has been left this time, he doesn’t immediately know. Sifting through his recent past, he settles on the last time he visited the storage unit. He vaguely recalls playing it in the space, letting the music warm him where he sat surrounded with pleasant memories of a place so mythical he swears it might have never existed at all.

He doesn’t at all remember where he got the key from. It might have arrived in the mail with an ominous note giving him the address, or perhaps Lily passed it on one day with her usual batch of cookies. However it came to find him, Rhett makes an effort to go there as often as he can get away. He takes the bus, watches the world that changes more and more with each trip pass him by, reminding himself to finally thank Lily for paying the unit’s upkeep fees.

Rhett goes alone each time, accompanied only with a cloud of guilt that shadows him when he thinks about the day it was all packed away without him. He should’ve been there, being one of the two in the beginning that started it all. He should’ve been there to end it as well, to see it through. Instead, he ran and said his goodbyes from afar with a letter. A coward to his own self-induced demise.

Truth be told, the beginning of the end had come along months before Rhett had even put pen to paper. He still remembers the day he walked away, as clear as the stars blinking down at him through his window.

They had sat opposite one another, a coffee table between them. For someone who always had words at the ready, they were struggling to come forth for him that day. An incessant tapping of feet on the woven rug distracted and drew Rhett’s attention. A stubbled chin propped up on hands clasped together waited for him to speak. The quiet pushed at him to say the words, to tell the truth, to have it over with. But a steadfast resolution stayed his tongue.

So he went for an alternate truth instead: _“I can’t do this anymore.”_

For a room that had heard so much in the few years that it belonged to them, the silence that followed was palpable with hurt. The happiness that had filled the space especially in recent times had all but fled, leaving behind a vacuum occupied only by his admission. He meant to alleviate the pressure that his long-upheld pretence had created, pressure that had grown to this point of no return. But with his deflection, it remained, continuing to mount as Rhett waited for a response.

Minutes passed, and soon enough, he was answered: with the groan of weight rising from a pleather armchair as muted footsteps began making their way out the door. Helplessly, Rhett watched the glare of azure eyes focus blankly at the floor, pointedly refusing to meet his.

Link was already gone, too far down the corridor for Rhett’s trembling apologies to reach him.

Not a day passes that Rhett doesn’t consider picking up the phone. It remains on his bedside table, dusty and outdated. He knows nobody wants to talk to an old man who took everything for granted, not without cause or a sense of guilt nudging them along. He gets it. He’s dead weight nowadays, drawing closer to an unspectacular end that he would have never seen coming for himself: an end spent alone, an end to a life without music and laughter and family.

The last time he felt the warm touch of hope was at Locke and Lily’s engagement party. His son spent the night beaming beside his bride-to-be, and the sight of them sparked a thought: Rhett saw within his eldest how it would have felt if he’d just taken a chance all those years ago, if he’d only listened not to the voices around him but to himself.

Locke had seen what was right in front of him all along, and he’d embraced it – while Rhett had not.

And then like clockwork, Link was there. Rhett watched from across the room as his old friend made his way toward the couple, shaking Locke’s hand in congratulations and kissing his baby girl on her cheek. They would soon be connected by family – Rhett’s boy would be Link’s son-in-law, half his in a way – yet another point of their lives that would be irrevocably intertwined. As if he’d heard Rhett’s mind speak, his eyes quickly found Rhett’s through the crowd, meeting again just for a second before they were whisked away by another.

Link disappeared that night before Rhett could right his wrong. It was the last chance he would ever have to do so.

Now his eyes drift back to the night sky outside. It’s strange, but it feels as if every star is out there tonight, visible even through the city smog, with Rhett tracing the shape of the galaxy that marbles a ghostly white through the inky expanse. It’s humbling, and he smiles: the world is gifting him one last feeling of wonder…

He can’t quite explain the sense of finality that lingers in the air tonight. Whatever it is, it’s oddly comforting as Rhett draws in breath, letting his eyes part with the marvellous sight beyond his window. His own heartbeat echoes in his ears, singing him a lullaby. A rush of warmth sweeps over him.

His eyes close.

 

Only truth follows him into the darkness. It always does, and Rhett has always fled.

He faces up to it this time, open now to the impending collision, unflinching to the ruinous aftermath when it rushes at him. But instead of pain, he’s struck with overwhelming clarity. A sense of peace. The feeling of home.

For seventy-three years, Rhett has known love in its many forms, keeping faith in its simple promise for a better tomorrow.

And now, from where he stands amid the void, he only hopes that love is all that waits for him on the other side, ready to forgive.

**Author's Note:**

> So who knew [two little words](https://youtu.be/rWUx8F7CGq8?t=10m51s) would inspire all of this?
> 
> As I mentioned, this is a follow-up to my fic _What Falling Feels Like_ , although I suppose it can be enjoyed (if that's what you want to call it) as a standalone. 
> 
> However you consumed this, thank you sincerely for reading! <3


End file.
